Waking Up Too Early To Be Late

At six-thirty in the morning, Paris was still asleep. It was a rich city full of beautiful people who liked to take their mornings late, and full of servants that had mastered silence while their sirs and madams slept in. Albert wasn't used to six-thirty, and six-thirty wasn't used to him. Not familiar with the desperate boy, son of a scorned man, that ran blindly through the streets, dressed in a way that no viscount should be.

But Albert didn't care about Paris, or time, or clothes. Didn't care about elections, gossip, formalities, the hellos-goodbyes of aristocracy, Albert cared about Franz, the man that had always-- he realized this now --cared too much about him.

Memories of birthdays past, spent on foreign beaches or elegant estates, money thrown like confetti, frowns as hard to find as a bad opera in Paris. Of Eugenie, and his parents, relatives and extravagant celebrations. Of Franz, always of Franz. Franz had always been there, each and every single time. There when Albert needed him, to be cried to, shouted at, laughed with, or held tight. This year was nothing like the last.

Albert hated this city, all it's pretense and all it's makeup. He hated all the secrets this city held, the ones that were dark and great and kept in sewers, capable of tearing up at any time and devouring people. Albert hated Franz. Because he couldn't miss Franz' eyes anymore than he did now, or his terrible arrogance and pride that only Albert was able to reveal. His upset silence, or his gentle kisses, his clam voice, the security of his bed through a storm. Albert was sick of Franz going away from him to prove his points.

Albert couldn't keep his frustration anger fear inside, and when he felt the tears sliding across his lips, his voice belted from him through the wind, high and destroyed, shattering the sugar plum dreams of the Mousiers and Mademoiselles who slept in their beds.

"Just out and say it, dammit! Stop leaving me to follow your trail of bread crumbs! Stop trying to do everything and telling me nothing, just say something!"

His own voice brought back memories, calling out Franz' name to the dark. One night, sharp nails, too much alcohol and too much skin, and they hadn't wanted to remember that their room had come with two beds. He had yelled and cried and grunted and moaned, and Franz, Franz hadn't so much more than gasped.

But the darkened buildings were watching Albert with suspicion as he tore past them, each façade simply something to cover the ground between here and there, from where he was to where he needed to be. The pills, the pills, the goddamn pills!